


There is No Easy Way Out from Here

by victoriousscarf



Series: Stars and Cinders [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU, Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Star Wars Setting, Bruce and Dick's this can never be simple relationship, Gen, The Justice League is the Jedi Council Slade Wilson is a Sith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-25
Updated: 2016-01-25
Packaged: 2018-05-16 04:01:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5813266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/victoriousscarf/pseuds/victoriousscarf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bruce adamantly never desired a padawan. His darkness was his own, never meant to be passed to anyone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	There is No Easy Way Out from Here

**Author's Note:**

> One of these days remind me to stop starting new fics.
> 
> That being said hello again from Star Wars hell.

“He will balance you,” they said, their eyes too serious and too sad and Bruce's teeth were on edge. 

“He will heal you,” they said too. 

“Together you will be better than either of you could be apart.”

“It is your duty as a Jedi to take a padawan.”

Bruce wanted to explain, all over again, what a bad idea that would be. He felt too keenly the layer of darkness, taunting him out of his reach but constantly trying to push in. He may have been powerful, but he would never be a good Jedi. Many years ago he had accepted that and swore to never pass his own pain and festering need for vengeance on to another soul.

Honestly he wasn't sure exactly why he was still in the Order, why they had not kicked him out.

But in the Order he remained and now they were pushing a child on him, murmuring about duty, and about the goodness of the boy and how much they could be.

And the boy was bright, he was like a fire in the Force. Not a supernova, not breathtaking power, not a signal fire to all those with Force sensitivity. But he was a beacon of the light, of a pure trust and faith in a world that so far had done plenty to try and crush him.

Even at five years old, he had seen his own parents murdered in front of him, and hardly had the most graceful or easy transition into the Temple, a trend that continued. Even when Bruce met him he had a split lip and the beginnings of a black eye from the other children, who even as hopeful Jedi were petty and cruel creatures. 

“They are jealous,” he said, shrugging it off.

“Hardly a Jedi emotion,” Bruce drawled and the boy shrugged again. Even though he was barely twelve, his body already had a certain grace and economy of movement that had Bruce appraising how effective the different forms would be for him. He would need something light, that took advantage of his wiry strength and would cause his enemies to underestimate him, but that would have power behind it. He would probably never be built like Bruce, who sometimes resembled a mountain as much as a man. 

He also already was blossoming more and more each day into his looks. Dangerous enough for anyone, but even more so in a Jedi. 

“They are jealous nonetheless,” the boy continued. “I am young, they say, and unready to be taken by a master. Unworthy.”

“Do you consider yourself unworthy?” Bruce asked, even though he had already tried to shield his heart against allowing this child in. 

That caused him to pause, his eyes fluttering before he looked at the sky instead of Bruce. “I am worthy to be trained,” he said finally and that answer made Bruce feel disquiet. 

“Whatever master you have,” Bruce said. “They will be hard on you. They have to be, for you to grow.”

The boy met his eyes again. “You sound like you do not wish to be that master.”

“I do not,” Bruce said gruffly and the boy looked away.

-0-

He will be good for you, the Council had said.

For a while, they were right. 

He had been pathetically unable to resist Dick Grayson, with his knowing eyes and quick smiles and fast hands. His resistance had crumbled and for a while he forgot to be afraid of himself. Certainly Dick was a handful, too willful and rash and constantly Bruce had to reach out and drag him back from the edge of danger. 

They did make each other better and Bruce resented the council for being right. Having Dick next to him was like carrying around a pocketful of the Light, there to remind him how beautiful it was, how worthy it was to fight for. 

And he pushed Dick until he was certain the boy would start resenting him. But nothing he did during training made that happen, as Dick soaked up his harshness and his lessons like a sponge. 

Later Bruce would regret that.

-0-

He wasn't sure when the flip occurred, when they started to fight more than they got along. Dick had always had a clever and quick wit and an easy smile. But Bruce was hard and cold and they were both too stubborn.

In fact Bruce was certain by the time Dick was seventeen that the council was watching them in horror as their plans fell apart in front of them.

“You must learn to be kinder to each other,” Kal-El said, his eyes heavy with worry.

“We were kind to each other,” Bruce snapped, because only that morning there had been another fight, Dick refusing to listen to him when he only wanted what was best for the boy. And he still was such a boy, despite his growth, despite the stunning progress he showed with a light saber. He had moved on to training with a second blade, and while Bruce was ambidextrous himself, he preferred the cleaner style of only one blade. 

Dick's light sabers were both a bright blue and Bruce found himself sometimes just watching his padawan go through the routines, his eyes unfocused so that all he saw was the blue light. It soothed him almost as much as meditation, until the next round of fighting happened.

It was worst on missions, when Dick and he would sometimes disagree so vehemently about the right course, they would actually split up. 

Never by Bruce's design but Dick was set on helping people to the point he would escort them out of danger before following mission directives. He also was brash and had leaps of logic and insight that Bruce for all his own brilliance sometimes could not keep up with. At the same time, sometimes Bruce forgot that Dick's mind was not his own, and he would disappear on a intuition, leaving his padawan behind. 

They had stopped more or less communicating in any real way. 

It made Bruce ache sometimes, because he could still remember the child that had convinced him, somehow, to accept him into his life, his routine, his heart and to train him and nurture him until he was ready to walk his own path.

Dick was not ready for the Trials but he was already insisting on walking his own path and Bruce was too stubborn to try and coax him back.

Which is when Dick went missing. 

They had been separated, for once by a complete accident as enemy fire rained down on them and the mining tunnels they were in could only be described as a maze. He turned around and Dick was no longer there.

Dick, he discovered quickly enough, was no longer on the planet at all. 

The council, for their part, tried not to blame him.

“A kidnapping of this scale could not have been carried out without advance planning,” Wally told him, and Bruce glowered at him. Once it would have made the younger master cower away from him, but Wally set his jaw and met his gaze head on. 

“Someone was after him,” Diana said. “Or you. Or any Jedi they could find. Nothing on that planet implied—” 

“And yet his is still gone,” Bruce said, a quiet roar. “He is gone.”

“We'll find him,” Diana said, with such certainty Bruce almost believed her.

But he didn't so he set out to find his padawan himself, disobeying direct orders to stay in the Temple and see to his own recovery. 

He hadn't realized, that despite their fighting, that Dick was still his bright light, his guiding beacon to stay within the path of the Light. With Dick missing, he felt himself all too easily sliding back toward the Dark, hovering and flirting around the edges of going too far. For many years he had danced on that balance and it hurt him more than he could ever say to do so again. 

By the time he came close to finding Dick, he realized the Council had been more right than they knew. The kidnapping had been advanced—advanced enough that Dick had been taken by a Sith. 

A Sith who kindly handed him back when Bruce got close enough. 

Bruce had fought his way through the station, leaving smoking droid parts in his wake. He could feel nothing living on the entire asteroid, except that bright point that was his compass, a presence he had not felt in far too long. 

When he reached the door, he didn't bother trying to unlock it, or see if there was any security measures on it. He just slammed his light saber through it and watched the metal melt away. When he could duck through he found Dick curled up in the corner, his shaggy head in his arms, clean and unhurt. But when he raised his head, his eyes were distant and he stared right through Bruce like he didn't believe he was there. 

“Slade, that's enough,” he whispered. 

“I'm not Slade,” Bruce said, holding a hand out and filing the name away. “He's not here, either. It's just you and me.”

Dick blinked at him, eyes darting from his face to his hand. 

When he didn't move, Bruce sat down in the doorway, crossing his legs and waiting for Dick to accept the truth of his words. He kept his awareness spread out, waiting for Slade to reappear but there was nothing, no echo of another approaching. 

Finally it seemed like Slade's patience for games would have ended and Dick crawled forward.

“Master?” he asked, his voice breaking on the word and Bruce held his hands out until Dick took one, grasping his hand with shaking fingers. “Master?” Dick repeated and slumped forward. Catching him, Bruce held him too long before urging them both to their feet and out of the station, on the edge of the mid rim and far away from any inhabited system. 

-0-

Dick had become too much to Bruce. Bruce could admit that to himself and he was certain some of those on the Council could see it. The recriminating stares he got had a slightly new flavor to them. Dick meant too much to him because he almost fell apart when Dick was gone.

That was not the Jedi way.

When Dick returned, for a long time he was quiet and withdrawn. He spent many hours with the healers, both physical and mental. After that, he was taken in front of the Council and probed and prodded to find out what had happened, and if he had succumbed at all to the Darkness. 

Bruce could have told them that already. His light was tarnished, certainly, and there was more fear and pain in his eyes. Sometimes he woke up screaming and Bruce spent the rest of those nights mediating until morning came. But despite some shadows he was still fundamentally what he had always been, a creature of the Light. 

His humor returned slowly, the flashes of his old determination starting to shine through more and more. Eventually he could even smile and pretend for whole days at a time that he was the same boy.

Their fighting had more or less ground to a halt, but Bruce hated Dick's quiet obedience far more. He hated that Dick no longer seemed to know how to stand for himself, how to make his own decisions or fight for them. 

Bruce found himself setting Dick up in impossible dilemmas in the middle of missions just to force him to react. 

Except he didn't, as if he didn't trust himself any more.

It was the most unorthodox reason to recommend a padawan for his Trials, but in every technical sense Dick was ready. Young still, but if he had not been captured he would have gone up for them on Bruce's insistence a year ago. 

As it was, he decided the only way to really heal Dick of his fear and lack of trust was to throw him out into the world on his own. Both for his own sake and Bruce's. 

He did not tell the council any of that reasoning, but he was fairly certain a few of them recognized it, and Diana certainly disapproved. 

But Dick passed the Trials, and Bruce for a moment felt so proud he wanted to throw up. He wanted to hold Dick, and never let him go anywhere without him. He wanted to explain everything he had felt, since as a child Dick had shoved his way into his life and turned it on its head.

Instead he twined the dark strands of Dick's padawan braid around his fingers and shoved his hands into the sleeves of his robe so no one else could see. “You have preformed well, Knight Grayson,” he said, voice carefully neutral and Dick looked at him, his eyes demanding more. “I look forward to hearing of your future progress.”

“Hearing,” Dick started, and looked like he had been struck. “Master, what does that mean?”

“It means you have a new life ahead of you,” Bruce said. “There is no reason for us to continue together. You have become a Knight and should make your own path now.”

“But that does not mean we cannot—” Dick started and he looked fragile, despite having just passed the stringent test to become a Jedi Knight. “We can still—” 

“I have no interest in that,” Bruce lied and hoped that the lie would have a purpose because Dick's hair was silky smooth between his hidden fingers and he ached all over, like he was healing from a battle. “We have been partners, yes, but it is time for us to part now.”

“Master,” Dick pleaded and Bruce inclined his head. 

“Farewell, Knight Grayson. May the Force guide your path,” and he walked away.

As he did he could feel the flare of anger behind him, which was quickly stomped out. At least Dick still refused to give in to his rage, and Bruce ached again at the familiarity of Dick's temper which he tried so hard to control.

But that did not wipe out the sheer devastation he could feel behind his back, the keening cry of loneliness and pain. 

Dick was a good Jedi, he would learn to control those emotions over time.

Better that he be hurt now, than later by Bruce. Better to make a clean break and allow the boy the chance he should have had at twelve when he could have made someone better, when he could have balanced out another lost Jedi.

It had already been too late for Bruce and he feared he had dragged Dick too far along after him.

The next time he saw Dick, his hair had grown out into a stubby queue and his light sabers were orange.


End file.
